Islay

Bruichladdich Ribera Del Duero (Micro Provenance)

Sean Handley Islay ,

105181-bigDistillery: Bruichladdich
Bottled: 2015, Distilled: 2004
Age: 10 years old
Cask: #007
Bottles: 303
ABV: 63.6%
Cask: Quercus Robur – Ribera del Duero Wine Cask
More Info: WhiskyBase

I’ve been looking forward to this one!

Now Bruichladdich have their core range pinned down, it seems their main avenue of creative weirdness has been channelled into their Micro Provenance series, a set of single cask whiskies produced with unique formulae.

The labels spell out every detail of their production and the series endeavours to do things that haven’t been widely done before in the industry.

The defining trait of this bottling is a full ten years in a Spanish red wine cask. It’s not unusual for a whisky to be finished (or *ACE’d, in Bruichladdich vernacular) in a wine cask after years in a Bourbon barrel, but full term maturation is a lot less common.

Let’s get it in the glass!

Nose: Menthol, sandalwood, crystal ginger, tequila with salted limes. Dusty icing sugar and sherbet. With water, still lots of salty citrus notes, but opening up to cake batter, red grapes, sour cherries and plum flesh.

Body: Very silky and buttery, even with a fair whack of water added.

Palate: Cranberries and hot cinnamon. Big, raw, chilli pepper burn. Yowzer. Needs water on the palate for sure.

At 40-50% ABV we get a lot more character. More salty citrus, but served in an egg custard tart. Nutmeg, raspberries, sour guava, and bitter green apple skin with developing white pepper.

Finish: Long and warm. Becomes malty, oaky, and dry, with baking spice and vanilla double cream.

This is a lovely dram. Really solid core character of the distillery (malty citrus, buttery palate, coastal saltiness) and the wine cask has imparted a notable but delicate influence on the whisky.

Really looking forward to tasting more in the series! They release more every now and then through online tasting packs on their online shop so do keep an eye out.

You can get this (and other) Micro Provenance bottling exclusively through the Bruichladdich online shop.

* Additional Cask Enhancement

Lagavulin Batch 1 (TBWC)

Sean Handley Islay , ,

Screen Shot 2015-10-23 at 17.47.05Distillery: Lagavulin
Bottled: 2015
Age: ???
ABV: 54.5%
Bottler: That Boutique-y Whisky Company
More Info: WhiskyBase

Here’s a rarity! An indie bottling of Lagavulin.

Nose: Tequila in porridge (a great breakfast favourite of mine), salted oatcakes, sourdough and marzipan.

Palate: More tequila notes, perhaps with grappa. Dry smoke wafts through candied lemons and tart, tangy plums.

Finish: Oaky and buttery with more peat tang and sea salt.

I’m sorry to say, this is too young for the price. Those white spirit notes of tequila are classic signs of young/new make whisky. They’re not unpleasant per se, but you get better notes with age.

Lagavulin spirit is excellent, as far as new make goes. But it needs longer than this in cask before it’s ready for drinking. I’d guess this is around the 5 or 6 years old mark. That might work for more robust distillate like Kilchoman but Lagavulin needs more time.

Sorry chaps at Master of Malt, but this isn’t a winner for my money! 500ml for £100. I’d rather have 700ml of 12 year old and have cash to spare…

Three Old Dusty Cadenhead Caol Ilas

Sean Handley Islay , , , ,

Very much following in the footsteps of Ben Cops, here’s three old and delicious Caol Ila bottlings from WM Cadenhead.

I’ve been saving the 30 year old for my 30th birthday and now that the bottle’s open it’s time to revisit last year’s 29 year old and get stuck into a taster of this year’s 31 year old release (again, thank you to Mr Cops for this!).

All three are full term Bourbon cask matured and great examples of how lovely Caol Ila can be when well-aged.

Caol Ila 29

Screen Shot 2015-09-14 at 16.08.10Distillery: Caol Ila
Bottled: 2013, Distilled: 1984
ABV: 55.5%
Cask: Bourbon Hogshead
Bottler: WM Cadenhead
More Info: WhiskyBase

Nose: Sweet smoke, cloudy apple juice, paprika, Easter Egg chocolate, damp wood, tangerine and fresh honeydew melon.

Palate: Very rich and oily. Bitter oranges, poached pears, more cloudy apple juice, with a gentle woody smoke rising through the fruit.

Finish: Becomes waxy and spicy, with a Brazil nut undertone. Extraordinarily long and satisfying. Like a deep-muscle massage for your mind. It unlocks something in the brain that leads to fits of grinning, like some kind of serene whisky Nirvana.

Verdict: I love this whisky so much. A really active cask (I think a first fill) has given this a lot of punchy flavour. The citrus smoke element of Caol Ila has moved from lemon notes in the younger bottlings to orange and melon flavours. Utterly glorious.

 

Caol Ila 30

Screen Shot 2015-09-14 at 16.08.24Distillery: Caol Ila
Bottled: 2014, Distilled: 1984
ABV: 56.2%
Cask: Bourbon Hogshead
Bottler: WM Cadenhead
More Info: WhiskyBase

Nose: Fragrant lime skin, earthy moss, sawdust, wood lacquer, sherbet, vanilla, orange pith, candy brittle.

Palate: Gloriously sweet shopp-y. Salty toffee, liqourice torpedos and sour zingy sherbet with a whole lot of fruit on the side – melon rind, guava, strawberries and tangerines. After the fruit there’s drying sweet tobacco leaf and a little Cadbury’s Chocolate Buttons.

Finish: Oak and black pepper with wafts of soft wood smoke and black tea. That Brazil nut taste is there again, too.

Verdict: Different to the 29. Still fruity and smoky but there’s none of that cloudy apple juice or pickle juice character. Still wonderfully balanced between the fruit and zesty smoke. Elegant, juicy, delicious.

 

Caol Ila 31

Screen Shot 2015-09-15 at 08.55.02Distillery: Caol Ila
Bottled: 2015, Distilled: 1984
ABV: 54.3%
Cask: Bourbon Hogshead
Bottler: WM Cadenhead
More Info: WhiskyBase

Nose: Spiced custard, wax crayons, marker pens, salty dust, marmalade, candied lemon and lime.

Palate: Zingy, sour and oaky with bitter pepper and more fresh citrus. Sherbet, chalky refresher sweets, green apples and redcurrants.

Finish: Mellows after the peppery bite of the palate leaving a long and lingering taste of ripe pears and smooth, buttery oak.

Verdict: I think this one’s got a lot more tanin from the wood but it settles down nicely to a lovely and unusual finish. The 29 and 30 had more going on in the middle but this is all about the long end.

Summary

Three fabulous whiskies here – really showing off both what Caol Ila can do over time, and what good cask selection you see from WM Cadenhead.

For me, the winner’s got to be the 29 – that juicy, punchy, fruity quality is rowdy compared to the more elegant dust of the 30 and 31 but it absolutely charms my palate.

The lesson? Taste old Caol Ila as often as you can – the chances are that you’ll be delighted.

Ardbeg 17

Sean Handley Islay

Distillery: Ardbeg
ABV: 40%
Cask: Bourbon Barrel
More Info: WhiskyBase

Here’s one of those mythical creatures of days gone by: the much-loved, and missed, Ardbeg 17. I’ve heard stories of this whisky for years now, and finally (thanks to Alex Blankenstijn at WhiskySample.nl) I’ve sourced myself a wee dram…

Nose: Honeyed vanilla coal dust. Permanent marker. Clean malty boiled sweets. Salty mineral-rich air with faint, light peat acridity. Some dusty tropical fruit and melon rind. Banana custard.

Palate: Light and delicate mouthfeel. A soft malty sweetness gives way to coastal notes and tangy, peppery peat. Then comes the fruit: leathery apricots smothered in honey with limes and nectarines soaked in brine, followed by a kick of sooty black pepper.

Finish: Chalky with lip smacking salt, more pepper, and creamy oak. Metallic tin right at the end.

Well that’s not what I was expecting! That mix of creamy, fruity salty flavour really reminds me of Bruichladdich. This is a much lighter whisky than the peaty engine-oil of a whisky that the distillery tends to produce nowadays.

No tour-de-force here, but a subtle, soft, fruity dram. Shame it’s so hard to source… If you see some, give it a taste!

Ardbeg Perpetuum Distillery Release

Sean Handley Islay , ,

Screen Shot 2015-06-15 at 20.08.08Distillery: Ardbeg
Bottled: 2015
Age: NAS
ABV: 49.2%
Bottles: 12,000
Cask: Ex-bourbon and ex-sherry
More Info: WhiskyBase

Another year, another Ardbeg Day release!

Only this time it’s a special year for the distillery at the end of the Kildalton road – they’re celebrating their bicentenary. So just to confuse everybody, they released not one special bottling but two! I guess that’s one each for both centuries?

This one is the distillery-only version released for the Feis Ile. Oddly, they changed their mind and decided to put it on sale on their website, causing havoc as their servers went down under the heavy traffic.

They also did the anniversary edition, bottled at a slightly lower 47.4% ABV and to the tune of 72,000 bottles.

Both releases promise elements of classic Ardbegs throughout the ages, with old and young spirit and a nod to the future as well as the past.

But beyond all the marketing spiel, what’s it actually like…?

Nose: Big flakes of sea salt on pretzels with air-dried ham. Dusty sherry notes of ripe plums, backed by briny iodine. Thick, sticky molasses with Jamaican ginger cake and malt loaf. Chewed rubber-tipped pencils, with fireplace hints of dry wood ash and old coal dust.

Palate: Sweet iced coffee with lots of salt and pepper. Creamy sherry trifle. Glacé cherry, bananas, juicy sultanas with rich malt syrup. More briny iodine notes swirled into chocolate sauce.

Finish: Super long and dry with oily espresso foam, salty ashes and sticky liquorice. Creamy, buttery oak.

Absolutely delicious. It’s desserty but not over the top – a really excellent balance of salt, sweet and bitter. It definitely tastes old and dusty with classic elements of more mature Ardbegs, and vintages from days gone by. I love the sherry influence – not as knockout as Uigeadail, more restrained and subtle.

Top notch, this. Thanks so much to Ben Cops for the sample.

The distillery edition’s long sold out on the Ardbeg site, but you can still find it on other retail sites and in auctions. Just don’t pay £400 for it like some people have!

Port Charlotte 2002 (Whisky Broker)

Sean Handley Islay , ,

IMG_20150528_100205345Distillery: Bruichladdich
Bottled: 2015, Distilled: 2002
ABV: 55.8%
Cask: Gran Callejo wine cask
Bottler: Whisky Broker
More Info: WhiskyBase

An absolute treat tonight! Whiskybroker have released a single cask Port Charlotte aged for twelve years in a Gran Callejo (Spanish) wine cask.

Nose: Salty and herbaceous, with dry earthy peat mud. Well-seasoned roast potatoes and sweet fried cabbage. Ready-salted crisps. Waxy jelly beans. Red apples, and juicy plum flesh. Fruit-flavoured rolling tobacco.

Palate: A sweet-yet-salty malt biscuit flavour starts, with a pronounced peppery peaty tang. Orange candy and citrus pith. Dry savoury notes of old bitter tobacco, leaf litter, and hazelnuts. With water the peat calms right down, the texture becomes soft and silky, and sweet white wine grape flavours come through.

Finish: Long, tingly and salty with a chewy mouth-coating peat residue, and a little cigarette ash. A touch of soap foam at the very end.

Mmmm, very more-ish! Another lovely wine-matured Port Charlotte with all those earthy, salty, sweet tobacco-rich notes.

These were £55 but snapped up within about 36 hours of release – sorry, but it’s all gone! 😦 Keep an eye on Whisky Broker’s website, Twitter and Facebook for details of releases. The good ones do tend to go fast.

Ardbeg Auriverdes

Sean Handley Islay ,

Distillery: Ardbeg
Distilled: 2002, Bottled: 2014
ABV: 49.9%
Bottles: 6,660
Cask: American Oak
More Info: WhiskyBase

Is 12 months enough time to let the hype of an Ardbeg Day release subside?

Hard to say, given the social media fever pitch (football pun intended) flying around whenever the distillery at the end of the Kildalton road sends forth a new shimmering green emissary into the foamy-mouthed, wild-eyed, peat-worshipping pandemonium.

With the spotlight firmly on the two slightly different Perpetuum releases, I felt it was time I really got to grips with last year’s Auriverdes, the world-cup bottling in honour of Brazil’s flag “Auriverdes”.

By all accounts, consensus from those who shout loudest is that this is a bit of a flop. Someone described it to me as being more a Schmeichel than a Gascoigne*. I’m not sure I’d agree there but it’s fair to say it’s atypical of Ardbeg bottlings, with the peat-junkies getting all rattly and agitated like Mark Renton after a disappointing miniature paper cup of methadone.

Let’s see if I can manage to be objective:

Nose: Very medical. Savlon cream and bandages. Lemon juice with cracked black pepper. Crispy smoked bacon fat. Vanilla pods in dark honey with a synthetic peach aroma. Thick black liquorice sticks.

Palate: Briny, but fruity. Smoky pineapple and grapefruit juice with peaty vanilla ice cream, cinnamon wafers, and a thick, oily espresso foam. Thinner and lighter than expected but still mouth-coating.

Finish: Long and dry, quite woody with ashy smoke. At the very end, a waxy/fruity/jelly sweet residue coats a medicinal, iodine-rich aftertaste.

Very interesting, this one. And very comforting to drink. I’d describe it as lightly peated (by Ardbeg standards). It has a lot in common with Caol Ila, though it retains an oily, tarry Ardbeg signature rather than the light and delicate Caol Ila zing.

In all honesty, I really like it. I’ve had a bottle open a few days now, and wasn’t sure at first, but it’s growing on me more every time I take a sip. The lack of punchy peat smoke really lets out the fruity side.

All in all, then, this is a winner. Maybe not what the peat-freaks wanted, but it’s a very drinkable and interesting dram all the same. I can see this going down well with a big salty slab of Brazilian beef steak.

After selling out last year, Ardbeg have made some more of this available on the Ardbeg shop for £79.99.

* That’s to say, a keeper not a drinker.

Bruichladdich Fishky

Sean Handley Islay

fiskyDistillery: Bruichladdich
Bottled: 2007, Distilled: 1992
Bottler: StupidCask.de
Age: 14 years old
ABV: 50.2%
Cask: Bourbon, Sherry + 3 months salted herring cask
More Info: WhiskyBase (fish) and WhiskyBase (pre-fish)

Here’s a well known weird (and rare) indy bottling of Bruichladdich.

This was bottled in Germany as two different bottlings. Both spent time in a single bourbon cask and a single sherry cask with half being bottled and the other half spending an additional 3 months in a salted herring cask!

First, the pre-fishy version:

Nose: Ozone and salty air. Sour cranberries in custard with dried apricots. Thick treacle and golden syrup. A whisper of mint fondant.

Palate: Vanilla custard and bursting fresh raspberries with salt, and a light hint of peaty earth. Chocolate and espresso grounds and some juicy spiced sultanas.

Finish: Creamy with black pepper and dessert spices.

Mmmmm this is a lovely Bruichladdich. Creamy, fruity, salty and sweet. Classic.

Let’s see how the herring cask changes it:

Nose: Much oilier and dirtier. Salty wet leather. A little vanilla but the fruit notes are gone.

Palate: Nicer than I expected! Salty and maritime still but sweet with toffee and vanilla notes. Very oaky.

Finish: Drying and leathery with no hint of fish at all. Spicy wood flavours. Slightly ashy.

So the fish barrel didn’t ruin the whisky but the wood definitely imparted a strong influence, very similar to virgin oak matured whiskies. Surprisingly good!

The pre-fish is the winner for me though, in spite of how surprisingly drinkable the fish cask is. The pre-fish is fruitier and much more delicate and interesting.

You’ll struggle to find these bottlings anywhere now. Probably occasionally at auction but they’re more a curiosity than a serious investment. One for the keen Laddie fan-boy at least…

Port Charlotte 13 (RABT)

Sean Handley Islay , ,

Distillery: Bruichladdich
Bottled: 2015, Distilled: 2001
ABV: 62.8%
Cask: Jurançon wine cask
Bottler: Rest And Be Thankful
More Info: WhiskyBase

This’ll be the third bottling I’ve tried from those mysterious people behind Rest And Be Thankful. The two Octomores they produced were very interesting and this one promises to follow suit.

At any rate, you’ll not see a Port Charlotte much older than 13 years these days because there wasn’t any made before 2001 so this is a treat for me – the oldest ever peated Bruichladdich whisky I’ve tried.

And it’s whacky wine barrel finished to boot – I’m no wine buff so I know nothing about Jurançon. Let’s see what it’s like…

Nose: Salted cashew nuts, crispy bacon and black pudding, dark chocolate, mineral oil, burning pinecones with dry soil and ashes.

Palate: Runny caramel mixed with a huge handful of sea-salt. Fragrant Kaffir lime leaves with spices: cayenne pepper, cinnamon and cumin with a touch of nutmeg. There’s an element of dry white wine in there, though I’m not sure I’d have noticed without knowing it was a wine maturation – it’s chalky and floral with a tart, bitter edge to it. Gets winier with water.

Finish: Very long and tingly with lingering smokiness, leaf litter, minerality, and the bittersweet taste of mild rolling tobacco. After a while, the taste of swimming pool water (though that’s not as bad as it sounds).

Wow – another indy bottling of Bruichladdich whisky that just piles on the weird and wonderful flavours.

This is a winner for me. It’s much more savoury than other wine maturation Port Charlottes (the PC6 was a sweet shop on the palate). Very long and lip smacking, and very drinkable at full strength. Great wood influence and a slightly calmer Port Charlotte peat smoke.

If you’ve a spare £129, you can pick this up from Master Of Malt.

Octomore 07.2

Sean Handley Islay , ,

Distillery: Bruichladdich
Bottled: 2015
Age: 5 years old
ABV: 58.5%
Cask: American oak, finished in Rhône Syrah Wine Casks
More Info: WhiskyBase

Here’s this year’s cask-finish Octomore, the travel retail exclusive 07.2 finished in French red wine casks which previously held wine made with those famously peppery Syrah grapes.

I’ve been wanting to try this for a while! These TREs from Bruichladdich can go for silly money so it took a while to source one at a sane price.

Nose: Opens with salty dark chocolate, orange wine gums, blackberries. Damp earthy peat bog leading to herbaceous lavender and dry basil. A faint sulphurous edge which, combined with the salt, reminds me of the smell you get when opening a pack of vacuum packed wafer ham.

Palate: Like someone peat-smoked a strawberry cheesecake! Viscous, golden barley syrup leads only to be t-boned by the Octomore signature peat juggernaut. As the peat fades you get the soft red fruit – strawberries and raspberries, with some kirsch cherry-chocolates

Finish: Long, lipsmacking oily peat with salt and pepper, and a touch of citrus. The peat’s very sticky – you can almost chew it. Slightly ashy, like the mouthfeel after a cigar.

Clean fruit meets dirty peat! I don’t like it as much as the 06.3 Islay Barley but it’s got a certain appeal for sure. That intense muddy peated chocolate character that runs through Octomore acts as a good backdrop for those red fruit high notes.

Another worthy experiment, Mr. McEwan.

I picked this up for about £88 on WhiskySite.nl – they’ve sold out now, but they do still have the 06.2 version for the same price.